<p class="MsoNormal" style=

“text-indent: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;”>The NIU men’s

basketball team dropped an 84-74 decision to Temple on Saturday

afternoon in Philadelphia.

<p class="MsoNormal" style=

“text-indent: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;”>Senior guard Xavier

Silas scored a game-high 27 points in the loss.

<p class="MsoNormal" style=

“text-indent: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;”>For the second time

in as many games, the Huskies (3-5) started off slow; surrendering

the first seven points of the game. The Owls kept NIU at an arm’s

length for the majority of the game.

<p class="MsoNormal" style=

“text-indent: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;”>The Huskies closed

the Temple (8-2) lead to six in the second half, but were unable to

get any closer in the loss.

<p class="MsoNormal" style=

“text-indent: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0pt;”>“I thought our team

played extremely hard, I thought we took a step forward today,”

said NIU head coach Ricardo Patton. “We had some different guys

come off the bench and give us a lift. We had chances, we went down

big but we continued to battle. We went down by about 16 in the

second half but came back to within six and had a chance, but we

took a couple of quick shots that didn’t go in and they were able

to build the lead back up.”